ex machina

the eric update - day 292: moving on.

things are quickly winding down at this sold house and it's nearly impossible to fathom all the changes that have occured since we moved into the house almost exactly a year ago as an experiment, of sorts, that we euphamistically called snowdeal show ®. as all the memories run together, it's hard not to collapse them into the feeling that the house has served perfectly as a physical manifestation of the demarcation of before and after.

perhaps odin is a little surprised to find out that his aunties and cousins really won't be quite so near anymore.

and what of us? we'll be moving on at the end of next week. i'll divulge that we'll be staying with family in grand rapids for the month of may so that odin has plenty of time to recover from surgery and see his doctor's for what we hope are his last couple of follow-up appointments. after that, assuming we get a clean bill of health for odin, we plan on doing some travelling.

i'm sure there will be many more tales of odin's adventures yet to be told.

9 Comments:

I have been reading your blog since the very beginning of Odin's birth. I have convinced friends to name their children Odin in solidarity. You have been nothing but detailed and forthcoming and that has been such a godsend for those of us in the VERY high risk for premature birth and elcampsia (as in the "why don't you adopt" group). It disappoints me you are now so close-lipped about this surgury, as you have no idea what an invaluable resource you and your pictures have become for those of us in your situation. I realise children are not to be compared, but it's always important we cover all scenerios before embarking upon pregnancy.

Take that however you will, and I hope you will continue to blog throughout your travels.

Use your head. It could be a completely optional surgery that many little boys have but that would be foolish on such a tiny preemie. It's a topic that creates a great deal of controversy, so why stir it up? (Eric, don't say anything -- I'm not trying to draw you out!!)

what a fantastic compliment! i'm glad that you have found and continue to find odin's adventures informative and perhaps a bit entertaining. i also understand why some might wonder why we decided to not discuss the surgery in detail.

the shortest answer is that as odin gets older, i've found myself trying to be more conscious about not discussing things that he may not want the entire world knowing in excruciating detail. ben over at the trixie update made a similar decision when he discontinued diaper telemetry and isn't planning on keeping detailed potty telemetry graphs, because maybe trixie won't appreciate it she realizes that the entire world knows exactly how long it took her to get the hang of the potty.

but i do understand that, especially for visitors that are new to the nicu, many of odin's tales are not the same as the minutia of potty training - so i sometimes have to find a difficult balance between his future expectation of privacy and providing information that in some small way helps those in similar situations make whatever decisions they need to make.

while i appreciate the intent of the second anonymous comment, who i assume is referring to circumcision (?), i feel i should mention that odin's surgery was not optional in the sense that some consider circs optional ( ha! let the flamewar commence ); it was, in fact, medically necessary and i'm not sure that it would be correct to describe it as a procedure that many little boys have done.

and with that, i'll leave probably more of you scratching your heads :-)

I think Odin has a little right to privacy, and as a family member I will back him on the fact that this surgery is not something that was "optional" - I think it would be valuable to preemie parents to learn about what it's like to have a baby go under anesthesia, get prepped for a surgery, recover from surgery and so forth. Perhaps a bit more discussion about that aspect of the experience might be enough to satisfy curious readers? My boys have had surgeries in various places, and I would describe the surgery experience as very similar, whether it's tonsils, tubes or wherever.

candy: I think it would be valuable to preemie parents to learn about what it's like to have a baby go under anesthesia, get prepped for a surgery, recover from surgery and so forth.

heh. we've done it so many times that i almost don't even think twice about the process, although you certainly don't ever get used to the moment where they cart off your wee one to the operating room. yes, the process was quite similar with his hernia surgery which i covered in more detail. the process was a little different for the rop surgery, but simply because we were already in the intensive care unit. interestingly, odin had the most difficult time recovering from the rop surgery which was supposed to be the least invasive of all of them. it's been my experience that it's almost impossible to predict how an infant will recover, although it's more true in the nicu where it's easy for stresses to temporarily cause everything to fall apart.

Yeah, I was alluding to circumcision but didn't want to mention it because it's started big flame wars on another blog I read. What I meant to get at was, had it been the surgery under discussion, it was your decision, not one for the whole world to weigh in on, it was already made and doesn't Odin deserve a bit of privacy in his diapers?

What I meant to get at was, had it been the surgery under discussion, it was your decision, not one for the whole world to weigh in on, it was already made and doesn't Odin deserve a bit of privacy in his diapers?

yes indeed, he does! and i really appreciate you supporting our wishes for privacy in his diapers. i just wanted to clarify that odin's surgery was not a circ. also, now that i know that you were definately writing about circumcision, you might be interested to know that they do routinely do circs on preemies usually just a few days before release from the nicu.

i'll leave the reader to guess what we think about non-religious, non-medical circs that are done "just because".

This is an aside about circumsision - we were watching our DVD of "Kids In The Hall" the other night and there was a Scott Thompson monologue about "I want my foreskin back" OMG, no matter where you weigh in on the issue, it was super funny.

[ rhetoric ]

“"it is hard to be brave," said piglet, sniffing slightly, "when you're only a Very Small Animal." rabbit, who had begun to write very busily, looked up and said: "it is because you are a very small animal that you will be Useful in the adventure before us."”

if you're new, you can browse the archives to catch up. and don't forget to watch a few movies that i made while we were in the neonatal intensive care unit. or if you want the abridged version and you can find a copy, you can read about his adventures in the november 2005 issue of parents magazine.